A week later, on May 5, Harford Systems employees noted flickering lights in the building and two employees who were outside saw sparks flying from the top of poles carrying two 33,000 volt lines into the company. Company officials discovered a dead bird, which they believed to be an osprey, at the base of an electrical pole.

“These birds are protected and it was tagged,” Tallio said. After he called the number on the tag, wildlife officials dispatched Cindy Kramer of Mid-Atlantic Wildlife Control to retrieve the bird. Dr. Keith Gold at Chadwell Animal Hospital later identified the carcass as being a juvenile female osprey.

BGE environmental scientist Greg Kappler, a BGE electrical crew and Kramer descended on Harford Systems the next day. Under the impression one of a nesting osprey pair had been electrocuted, the impromptu team was prepared to shut off power to Harford Systems, lower the nest to the ground and rescue motherless fledglings.

“We agreed to a 3 p.m. shutdown. It was quite an operation. Everyone was outside watching,” Tallio said. The operation came to an abrupt halt, however, when Kappler observed two ospreys, appearing anxious, flying overhead and the electrical crew discovered two eggs in the nest.

Harford Systems agreed to another 3 p.m. shut down the next day, to permit BGE to relocate the nest. Crews erected a dummy pole near the original nest site and relocated the nest, which now held three eggs, to a high-rise platform designed to keep the nest in place. BGE then placed obstacles at the nest’s old site to deter future nest-building.

Tallio saw four work trucks and 10 BGE staff onsite for the Harford Systems nest relocation and said, “It has to be very costly from BGE’s standpoint.”
Kappler said installing dummy poles and relocating nests has become just another part of doing business for BGE. Shanefelter declined to put a price tag on nest relocation operations.“This is our seventh nest relocation this spring. Since 1990, we’ve moved 35-40 osprey nests and this January, we relocated our first eagle’s nest,” Kappler said, noting that the U.S. Migratory Bird Treaty Act protects ospreys, eagles and other migratory birds. Birds relocated by BGE have accepted their nest’s new location in as little as 15 minutes.

Regarding the deceased osprey, Kappler and Kramer agreed the bird likely was a hatchling from last year, given its size. “She was probably just following mom. Animals are very family oriented,” Kramer said.

According to the Cornell Lab of Ornithology, ospreys are among the largest predatory birds in the U.S. They feed almost exclusively on fish and commonly nest on manmade objects, such as duck blinds, channel markers and telephone poles. Between the 1950s through the 1970s, ospreys and other raptors declined to the point of possible extinction because pesticides such as DDT entered the birds’ food supply. These chemicals caused thin eggshells, which crushed during laying or by the weight of a bird sitting on it. Since banning DDT, the U.S. osprey population has recovered significantly.